


A Chance Encounter

by circ_bamboo



Category: Carroway Family - Suzanne Enoch, Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Crossover, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-03
Updated: 2011-05-03
Packaged: 2017-10-18 22:22:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/193940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/circ_bamboo/pseuds/circ_bamboo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Future snippet from Regency!AU: Joanna McCoy meets a gentleman in the garden.</p><p>Crossover with Suzanne Enoch's Carroways/Lessons in Love series. (Edward is the youngest brother.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Chance Encounter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [boosette](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boosette/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Nine Years Later](https://archiveofourown.org/works/128505) by [circ_bamboo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/circ_bamboo/pseuds/circ_bamboo). 



Ballrooms were stuffy, horrible places, full of stuffy, horrible people, and Miss Joanna McCoy, of no particularly wonderful family but dowried by the Earl of Riverside and therefore quite artificially popular, disliked all things stuffy and horrible. Which is why, even though she liked the Baron and Lady Prescott very much (they were neither stuffy nor horrible), she was in the process of sneaking out the back door at their ball to take air in the garden.

It was surprisingly easy to manage; the ball was a mad crush, as Uncle Jamie (that is, the Earl of Riverside) might say. She made it all the way out to the garden--completely deserted, as it had been raining earlier--and was rounding a corner when her ankle twisted. It was the same ankle she'd twisted a few weeks ago while attempting to prove she could still climb trees, and she found herself falling backwards and sideways. All of a sudden, unexpectedly, she was--sitting in someone's lap?

"Oof," said the someone, and rather than jump up immediately (among other things, her ankle did hurt), Joanna turned to see on whom she was sitting.

Oh. Edward Carroway, she was fairly certain. Dark brown hair, blue eyes, broad shoulders, and fashionable coats--even though she couldn't see them, she knew him as he was the youngest brother of Viscount Dare, a friend of Uncle Jamie's. "Hello," she said. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Mr. Carroway said. She couldn't see his face clearly in the darkness but he sounded confused. "Miss McCoy?"

"Yes," Joanna said. "I apologize but I've twisted my ankle." She really should have gotten up many, many minutes before, but--he was so warm--and she was probably ruined anyway.

"Ahh. I'm sorry," he said, and his hands, previously in the air, settled around her waist. "Shall I help you stand?"

"If you could," she said, obliquely disappointed.

"I will," he said. "But not before this--" One hand lifted from her waist, settled gently on her cheek, and turned her face to his. Before Joanna could do anything other than blink, his lips touched hers, gently, no more than a bare moment of pressure before lifting away.

"Oh," Joanna said. "Oh."

"Will you save a waltz for me, after your ankle heals?" Mr. Carroway asked.

"Yes," she said, and saw a flash of white teeth as he lifted her off his lap and set her carefully on her feet.

"I can't walk you all the way inside," he said as he stood. "That is, not unless you wish to be ruined."

"I might consider it if it meant no more stuffy balls," Joanna retorted. She tested her ankle gingerly and was pleased to find that it would hold her weight with only slight pain.

Mr. Carroway laughed. "Oh, Miss McCoy, I almost believe you, but I know of your uncle Jamie and your uncle Christopher and I do not want to be the gentleman on your arm when you walk back into that ballroom."

"But I might meet you inside there," Joanna said, and wondered where exactly that tone had come from even as she heard it come out of her mouth.

"You might," Mr. Carroway said, and she could hear him smiling, even if she couldn't see it.

This time Joanna leaned in and pressed her lips briefly to his before pulling away and saying, "I'll take my chances."

She imagined she could feel him watching her all the way inside.


End file.
